What Can I Do More as a Controller or Cfo

The pandemic accelerated every successful organization's need to be nimble and flexible. Companies that automated processes prior to COVID-nineteen were able to operate seamlessly, but other companies were forced to reinvent themselves without the benefit of timely information and insight. This sudden shift created new challenges and opportunities for corporate controllers and CFOs, who were expected to support the constant change and disruption that became the norm over the past two years.

Across industries, controllers and CFOs had to deal with higher demands and expanded responsibilities in shorter time frames. Controllers gain feel that's necessary to go finance leaders, but those with aspirations to reach the CFO level must stretch themselves beyond their traditional role and skill set up by becoming operational and strategic leaders too. Some companies hire finance chiefs without an accounting background, and then the contest is fiercer than always earlier.

NEW PRESSURES FOR CONTROLLERS

Traditionally, the controller role has been tactical, handling the solar day-to-mean solar day, behind-the-scenes activities of the finance function—processing the month-end financial close and only the close. Technology that enables automation provides much-needed relief for finance and accounting teams. By adopting technologies that eliminate transmission processes and shorten financial shut cycles, controllers and CFOs accept more time to focus on strategic planning and providing insight across reporting the numbers in the profit and loss argument (P&L).

Controllers sit down at a crucial juncture—betwixt the C-suite and the accounting team—so it'due south no surprise that the pandemic impacted them professionally and personally. Controllers don't only pay attention to the numbers; they likewise have to become groovy leaders and monitor the well-being of the team.

In a recent FloQast written report, which surveyed more than than 250 controllers and upper-level finance professionals, information technology was clear that automating the monthly financial close process delivers huge benefits beyond the accounting and finance function by speeding up operations and ensuring the accuracy of the books. Bookkeeping workflow automation solutions aimed at impacting the calendar month-cease close increase shut visibility, accurateness, and speed across a remote or hybrid squad. Automation is designed to assistance finance teams stay on track and become more than efficient even while working remotely or being downwards team members during part of the year.

The tight labor market is making it hard to observe the talent that organizations need in their accounting department. Automation also allows organizations to calibration without increasing head count. While the number of many companies' chore openings has grown, the college degree pipeline is in danger of not keeping pace with the need for finance and it professionals.

This means that many controllers and bookkeeping teams will need to do more with fewer people. One FloQast survey respondent recommended "…finding systems to automate as many of your accounting tasks as possible, freeing upward your time to manage, make decisions, and train as elevation priorities. You can't practise it all, so relying on technology to free up your plate should be top of heed. Everything else will fall into place."

Automation can't do everything, though, and talented, experienced controllers are valuable even in a profession increasingly transformed by technological innovation. Survey respondents plant that every bit organizations add automation and AI, making sure the finance function has the right squad members is more important than whatever software or process.

EMPOWER THE Squad

The controller's role is i of the nearly challenging in the company. The chore of the controller is dynamic, with new and frequently unexpected problems occurring oft. Having a strong squad to share the workload is essential. Leading a squad, still, as well comes with the responsibility of hiring and firing.

A controller who responded to the survey advised that "…it'southward better to switch out underperformers than to exist concerned with transition and the touch on on short-term workload." Finding the correct mix of talent and head count for a team means controllers shouldn't "…underestimate staffing needs and the capabilities of electric current staff. Open up conversations with leadership and staff are then important." Hiring during a pandemic came with its own challenges, according to one respondent: "Onboarding and defining culture while working remotely was considerably harder than I had imagined."

Not surprisingly, collaboration software platforms such as Zoom and Microsoft Teams came out on meridian when controllers were asked which tools were virtually critical to their team during the pandemic. With remote and hybrid work hither to stay, 89% of controllers who responded to the survey ranked them every bit nearly important. According to one controller, "I know better now how to connect my team across continents, making the department experience as 1."

CONTROLLERS' BALANCING ACT

While the demands on controllers have been increasing for some time, successful organizational leaders understand that beingness a keen direction accountant and finance function leader requires more but beingness skilful with numbers. The all-time direction accountants understand the rules that govern what they exercise, guidance from the business, and how to apply technological innovations and better operational processes to make the organization run more efficiently.

Depending on the size of the company and its leadership structure, there are likely many opportunities to be more easily-on and evolve the part of the controller to become more than involved in fiscal planning and analysis, treasury, taxation direction, and information systems, among other functions. Encounter "How Controllers Provide Increased Value" for more than on this.

The controller is a vital role that balances various responsibilities. As the office of the controller shifts from being a steward of resource to a correspondent of strategic insights and a catalyst for alter, technology is helping controllers embrace those bigger demands. One controller delighted in how dynamic the function has go: "I beloved the reach of this position and how many more resources are available today to effectively manage responsibilities than when I started!"

To lead such wide-ranging activities, controllers must accept a growth mindset and focus on organizational strategy. While some controllers and enterprises are content to keep the controller role the same equally it was pre-pandemic and before the era of digitization, organizations that adopt a new way of thinking well-nigh the controller role will likely run into greater success in operations and their lesser line. Increasingly, organizations are filling CFO roles from nonaccounting backgrounds, which has created a much more competitive market place for controllers looking to rise to the CFO level.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE CFO

Just as the controller role is evolving, finance professionals must stay on top of the trends that are transforming the CFO part. Traditionally, the CFO'south main roles were preserving the avails of the organization by minimizing adventure, getting the books right, and running an efficient and effective finance performance.

The CFO role has actually evolved over the last 20 to thirty years. 30 years ago, the CFO and finance team were responsible for ensuring that the P&L was right and were viewed as "budget cops" from whom it'due south necessary to seek approval. Twenty years ago, the CFO started to communicate the company's value proposition and strategic vision to investors to raise money and rounds of financing. X years agone, CEOs looked for CFOs who could articulate the lifetime value of a customer and other metrics to forecast potential business organisation outcomes ten years out, but their role was however primarily limited to finance.

In the last v years or so, CFOs have become business partners with other senior executives, such every bit the master data officer, chief marketing officer, principal operating officer, and other business organisation unit leaders. This is due in part to the demand to link nonfinancial metrics to the P&L and exist able to pinpoint when the revenue will come in. Additionally, CFOs have had to shift their focus to enterprise-wide performance, growth initiatives, and business transformation, making it increasingly important for CFOs to exist strategists.

THE 2022 CFO PIVOT

A controller should strive to add to their skill set to make them a potential candidate to become a CFO. In one case they've attained that promotion, in order to step up to the challenge of performing at a strategic level, CFOs have to reimagine how they view their part and their team. Even prior to the COVID-nineteen pandemic, CFOs could lag relative to other functional areas in terms of how they evaluated employees. CFOs judged their employees based on how long they were at the office or how hard they seemed to piece of work. At present, especially since the pandemic forced many to work from home, CFOs have had to rely on operation data to evaluate their teams. Ensuring that their team consists of top talent, is productive, and feels valued at the organization will help today's CFOs focus on new priorities.

To act as catalysts for change, CFOs must instill a fiscal arroyo and mindset throughout the organization to assist other parts of the business perform ameliorate. The CFO needs to be viewed as an integral part of pinnacle management at the company, making an endorsement from the CEO crucial. Additionally, to make the shift from reporting to helping shape the overall strategy and management of the enterprise, CFOs need the following skills, some of which aren't necessarily finance-related:

• Business perspective, modify and conflict management, organizational agility, and facilitation
• Strong communication and change management skills
• Strong leadership and business concern partnering skills
• An ability to create a culture of risk intelligence to manage risk while executing concern strategies
• Understanding of key functioning measurements to measure the success of strategic and operating initiatives

Successful CFOs bring far more than than financial expertise to their organization. They're effective leaders, information analysts, and strategic planners.

Stride OUTSIDE THE BOX

Organizations are looking for the CFO to provide leadership based on the numbers, rather than focusing solely on the numbers. The power to understand valuable, relevant data and provide guidance to the organization is imperative for a CFO. The consequence is increased efficiency, new ways to become to market that are aligned with customer needs, and an ability to brand decisions and organizational changes quickly, rather than needing years to roll out a new initiative.

These aren't skills that controllers have traditionally learned in their instruction or even on the job. While direction accounting and finance professionals, including controllers, are used to ongoing education, in about cases, that pedagogy doesn't include the nonfinance experience needed. By stretching themselves and taking on projects on the business side of the enterprise, controllers can gain the skill sets necessary to rising upwards in the organization. There are several ways to gain the experience, including:

Beingness proactive. Accounting can be very "in the weeds." Leveraging insights into the numbers and looking beyond them to empathize the bigger picture and the visitor's business organization goals is imperative for anyone looking to take on the CFO role.

Listening. Having a smashing relationship with the sales department creates a powerful internal collaboration that results in better processes, more assisting deals, and bounty plans that align with business goals. Given finance's historical office of existence the "no" people in an organization, it's even more than important for CFOs to listen to the heads of other departments and be flexible, assuming that no ethical lines are beingness crossed and no unnecessary risks are being taken.

Engaging. Understanding how sales goes to market and working together with the business development squad to create contracts that work for both the business organization and customers are key to long-term profitability. The finance and sales relationships should exist isolated to the leadership level. Controllers and CFOs can provide immense value to sales executives down the line with customer profitability insights.

"BUDGET COPS" NO MORE

Gone are the days of the controller and CFO being the "no" people of the organization. The new environment of fast-paced change and unpredictable disruptions to business models make evolving the controller and CFO roles fifty-fifty more crucial to the organization'southward success. By adopting technology that lightens the transmission workload, today'southward finance leaders can:

• Provide business concern insight to sales and operations on customer profitability;
• Predict the total value of each customer for the ­system;
• Assistance product evolution based on customers' desired features and capabilities;
• Work with the chief data officer to decide if the current tech stack is the optimal one for the business;
• Represent the company to the board of directors and investors; and
• Act as a liaison between departments and operationalize processes to create desired results.

Having a system where personnel can have insights from multiple functions and teams in one place is critical. Calculation fiscal data to other operational information tin can be particularly impactful when brought back to the business organization and contextualized. 1 example of the benefit derived from this kind of analysis is creating new compensation plans in order to change business organization behavior by sales and operations teams. In another example, CFOs and controllers work jointly with sales to redesign contracts to optimize profitability per client.

Information technology'South ABOUT More THAN THE BOOKS

Today, technology enables the close process to be dramatically shortened. In add-on to speeding upward the process and ensuring its accuracy, we've identified three boosted benefits:

1. Making people's lives better. Anything that can be done to make the closing process easier, shorter, and less painful is a positive stride.

2. Allowing the finance squad to spend more than time on strategic projects, across the close. Controllers who desire to make the leap to CFO accept to demonstrate their power to influence the business and have a slap-up productive team. 1 definitive way to show that ability is to harness the power of engineering science to gain business insights beyond the raw numbers. Past doing so, controllers can leverage that information to influence the business and how information technology performs. For case, finance knows every customer'southward contracts meliorate than anyone else at the visitor. It can bring the insights that it'southward seeing in its fiscal reporting and use them to operationalize for better revenue results.

3. Enabling controllers to rent better talent. Given that talent is the critical component of whatever successful business organisation, automating fiscal reporting results in greater retention rates. Arduous and painful close processes inhibit hiring elevation talent and cause exhaustion and turnover in the finance department.

Not only do these solutions boost productivity, but when leveraged properly, the insights from the finance function can likewise be practical to all functional areas of an arrangement. This creates a major opportunity for controllers and other direction accountants and finance leadership to heave their existing skills and acquire new ones. In order to make the leap to CFO, controllers have to demonstrate the ability to influence the organization's performance and strategy, and that depends greatly on having a stellar, productive squad.

STEPPING Upward

One startling result from the tumultuous yr 2022 is that COVID-19 made u.s.a. stronger. In fact, 40% of controllers surveyed said that they used their experiences working remotely to bulldoze a faster shut than before the pandemic. They're quickly adopting a remote or hybrid model that allows for improve work-life remainder and higher productivity. Communication and collaboration tools have get essential for working with a remote or hybrid team, while close management tools make the all-important month-terminate process smoother.

The coming years will continue to redefine the controllership and CFO roles. We don't know what unknowns are in store for business organisation, only with the right people and information systems, organizations can predict and speedily respond to market changes. This is the best time in history to be a controller or CFO. Thank you to an explosion of technology available to finance and accounting professionals, the jobs are more challenging, dynamic, and strategic than always.

The finance function will proceed to be able to demonstrate its value in every arrangement by providing insights and guidance that get beyond the numbers. If you're interested in impacting the business from within the finance organization, now is the time to have on new challenges and learn new skills. You're in a unique position to drive existent value and innovation for your organization, as well as further your own career.

Mike Whitmire, CPA, is the CEO of FloQast, an accounting software vendor specializing in close management. Y'all tin reach him at mw@floqast.com.

---

Razzak Jallow is the CFO of FloQast. Y'all tin reach him at rj@floqast.com.

---

Greg Vecellio is the controller of FloQast. You can accomplish him at gv@floqast.com.

You may also like

vargasfortard.blogspot.com

Source: https://sfmagazine.com/post-entry/december-2021-from-controller-to-cfo/

Share this post